21st September, Ashgabat: Annop Arromsaranon of Thailand finally broke the ice on his third appearance to strike the first gold medal of the 5th Asian Indoor & Martial Arts Games with victory in the Men's Singles event.

Annop, who had only managed to finish tenth in the preliminaries, was awarded the eighth and final quarter-final spot based on the rule that only two players from each NOC can advance into the quarter-finals. Kang Hee Won and Kim Kyung Min of Korea finished second and third while a third Korean, Choi Bok Eum had to give away his spot to Annop.

Annop sailed past Squad A winner and top-seed, Wang Zhiyong of China, 217-160 in the quarter-final match to advance to the semi-final. The Thai was equally impressive when he dispatched fourth-seed, Wu Hao-Ming of Chinese Taipei, 226-184 to reach the final.

Seventh-seed, Kenneth Chua of Philippines out-classed sixth-seed, Ivan Tse of Hong Kong, 264-228 to face Annop in the gold-medal final match. The Filipino got off to a poor start with a split in his opening frame which he failed to spare.

Annop Arromsaranon with his first gold medal

Although he struck in his second frame, another ill-luck split in the third frame put the title contender on a back foot. Annop spared his first frame before reeling in three consecutive strikes to open up a 34-pin lead.

Chua recovered with a double strike in the fourth and fifth frames but his opponent was on a roll adding four more consecutive strikes to put the match beyond the Filipino. Annop went on to seal the match, 247-212 and winning the first gold medal of the competition.

"This is probably my biggest win ever and my first gold medal after three appearances at the Indoor Games," said the delighted Annop. "I'm so lucky to earn a spot in the quarter-finals and I thought that anything that came my way will be an added bonus.

"To make it to the semi-finals had assured me a medal but to reach the final and win the gold is simply amazing. I'm now hopeful that I can win more medals for my country in the other two remaining events."

"I was quite confident going into the final especially after easy victories in the quarter-finals and semi-finals," said the 25-year-old 2017 Philippines Open champion, Chua. "But the poor start completely took away that confidence and the high hopes I had.

"But I'm still happy to pick up the silver medal in my debut at the games. I hope I can carry this good momentum into the next two events and do well."

Men's Singles medallists, Chua, Annop, Wu and Tse

Wu Hao-Ming and Ivan Tse earned the bronze medal after losing their matches to Annop and Chua in the semi-finals. In the earlier 6-games preliminaries, Wang Zhiyong of China topped the round with 1443 followed by Kang Hee Won in second with 1437.

Squad B winner, Kim Kyung Min finished third with 1420 ahead of Wu in fourth with 1387 and 2016 QubicaAMF World Cup champion, Wang Hongbo of China in fifth with 1379. Tse and Chua took sixth and seventh positions with 1378 and 1374 respectively.

The Women's Singles 6-games preliminaries will be contested tomorrow commencing at 9.00am local time. The top 8 finishers will advance to the quarter-finals shootout. Again only two players from each NOC can qualify.